Obama, Leahy and Kerry Make it Easier for Terrorist Supporters to Enter US

It would allow in those who provided “limited material support” to terror groups

The Obama administration has unilaterally eased restrictions on asylum seekers with loose or incidental ties to terror and insurgent groups, in a move one senator called “deeply alarming.”

The change, approved by Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson and Secretary of State John Kerry, was announced Wednesday in the Federal Register. It would allow some individuals who provided “limited material support” to terror groups to be considered for entry into the U.S.

Supporters of the change, including Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., argued that the current ban on anyone who has ever aided terrorists has unfairly blocked thousands of refugees.

“The existing interpretation was so broad as to be unworkable,” Leahy said in a statement. “It resulted in deserving refugees and asylees being barred from the United States for actions so tangential and minimal that no rational person would consider them supporters of terrorist activities.”

And if one of these deserving refugees murders Americans, we know where to send that bill.

Though the change would apply to those who helped non-designated terror groups, Sessions noted that Al Qaeda, for example, was not officially designated as a foreign terror organization until 1999.

And Obama Inc. has dragged its feet on designating Al Qaeda affiliates and genuinely genocidal groups such as Boko Haram FTO's.

“In light of these and other facts, it is thus deeply alarming that the Obama administration would move unilaterally to relax admissions standards for asylum seekers and potentially numerous other applicants for admission who have possible connections to insurgent or terrorist groups,” Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., said in a statement on Thursday. “We need to tighten security standards for asylum, not relax them even further.”

Sessions also complained that the administration was, on its own, altering the Immigration and Nationality Act. “What is the point of Congress passing a law if the administration abuses its ‘discretion’ to say that law simply no longer applies?” he said.

This is another reason why amnesty in any form and with any restrictions is unacceptable. Obama Inc. just doesn't follow the law.